This post includes an excerpt from chapter 13, which gives comprehensive information on how to acknowledge, recognize, and respond to the thirteenth step in the journey through dementias and Alzheimer’s Disease: ensuring that our loved ones always know that we love them and are committed to them all the way.

Although showing our love and commitment is something we do throughout our lives with our loved ones, this step is another conscious one that we need to practice as these neurological diseases progress and our loved ones seem to begin to disappear and we can bogged down as their care needs increase. There is never not enough time for love.

“At this step, and indeed throughout the entire journey of dementias and Alzheimer’s Disease, we must always make sure that our loved ones know the we love them, we care about them, and we are committed to them.

As our loved ones become more dependent on us and as they lose cognition and neurological function, they often become fearful. Their fears include being isolated, being abandoned, being a burden, and being in the way. For those who are still able to communicate at this step, much of their conversations with us will include these fears.

It is our job to allay those fears and remind our loved ones with dementias and Alzheimer’s Disease that we’re on their side and we’re not going anywhere. Spending a lot of time with them becomes more critical at this step as do what we do with our loved ones during that time together.

How can we demonstrate our love, our commitment, our care and our concern in tangible ways?

Quality time

One of the most reassuring things that we can do for our loved ones with dementias and Alzheimer’s Disease is to spend quality time with them. This is not just spending time, but it is time where our attention is completely dedicated to them.

While quality time can include some sort of fun or interesting activities, more often than not, it is just being with them and listening to them, interacting with them, and giving them our undivided attention.”